Tag: dance

Kelly Graham is thrilled to be returning to Family Week this year. After a long hiatus, which ended last year, she is so excited to see all her friends old and new! She teaches Morris Dance and Drama Improv. Be sure to bring your bells and hankies!!

Lindsay Verbil is a caller whose warmth, enthusiasm, and clarity empower dancers to feel capable, confident, and connected to the music and to each other. Her teaching style is focused and precise, while her good humor and sense of fun create a welcoming and joyful space. A dancer herself, as well as a musician, organizer, and co-host of the web series “5 Things,” Lindsay brings together a tangible love for all facets of the dance experience.

Rhonda Cayford has been an avid contradancer for over 40 years, starting in Boston in 1978 and having the good fortune to move to San Francisco in 1980, just as the dance scene was taking off here. She discovered rapper at BACDS English Week in 1986 and it has been her passion ever since. She is the founder of a womens’ rapper team called Twisted Sisters, and was a long-time member of Swords of Gridlock. She has taught Rapper, Longsword, Cotswold, and Northwest Morris at camp. In 2022 and 2023, she held the role of camp programmer.

Shirleigh Brannon has been involved with different kinds of Irish and Scottish dance, music, and singing for many years/decades in various locations. Helping others feel like they can participate at whatever level they are is one of her ideas of  having fun.

Yoyo Zhou has been calling contra dances since 2012 across the continent and is excited to participate in Family Week for the first time. He likes to put dancers at ease with clear teaching and a calm and cheerful presence. He enjoys helping everyone get as much fun out of each dance as possible.

Julie James was an international folk dancer in her youth. She later found English country dance, then morris, and never looked back. In 2000 Julie formed Wild Wood Border Morris, where she focuses on teaching complex, fun dances with an emphasis on both precision and exuberance.

Kalia Kliban (CA) has been part of the Bay Area dance community since the mid-80s, performing and teaching morris, longsword, American clog, English clog, contra, and English country dance. Among her other useful talents are the making of excellent pipe-cleaner sculptures and the juggling of a wide variety of supermarket produce. Her clear and humorous teaching style has gotten feet tapping at camps and gatherings in California and beyond, and she’s been part of the Family Week community since 1996.

Kelsey Hartman has been calling contra and family dance since her debut at the San Francisco contra in 2013. She can be found calling dances all around the Bay Area and beyond. She is also a member of Twisted Sisters Rapper Sword Team. To her, the world of folk music and dance seems like home! She holds a Masters in Fine Arts in Theater and spends her year teaching middle schoolers medieval world history and English. For the last two years her summer break has taken her to the East Coast to tour as a caller.

Sharon Green has been calling and choreographing English country dances since 1993. Since the pandemic, her current major dance activity has been co-leading (with Kalia Kliban) the Oddly Even Sundays English dance on Zoom, as well as calling for BACDS’s virtual Fall Frolick, Hey Days, and Family Week. She is a regular attendee and occasional staff member of in-person Family Week with grandson Santi.

Yaëlle Azoulay (French Canadian dance) is a professional dancer/choreographer specializing in Quebecois traditional dancing and percussive dance (jig). Through a musical approach, she’s been actively developing stepdancing teaching methods for all ages and levels. She has also been calling social dances for 20 years, both for large events and traditional dance nights. Her human approach, her passion for dance, and her deep regard for initiatives that involve social action are but a few of the many strengths that have given her recognition as one of the best in her field on the Quebec scene.

Ann Kwinn joined the staff in 2022 after many years as a camper.  She first came in 2015 when her daughter was only 3 years old.  Ann was a member of the Westchester Lariats folk dance troupe growing up and later became the artistic director. She has taught hip hop for the Young Olympians, ballroom for Arthur Murray Dance Studio and clogging for the City of Duarte. Ann choreographed for the Kentwood Players, the Ventura Improv Company and the Azusa Renaissance Theater. Ann performs with the Cripple Creek Cloggers.

David Newitt arrived at Swarthmore College in 1976 and was shocked and dismayed to discover a two year physical education requirement. Faced with the alternatives of football and “folk and square dancing” the choice was clear, and he has been dancing ever since. International folk dancing, English and Scottish Country Dancing, Morris and sword teams, contra dancing…all are wonderful community activities, and sharing them has been his passion for 40 years. David is greatly looking forward to a return to Family Camp after being absent for way too many years.
Along with his fiddling wife Heather MacKay, David also loves playing music for English and Scottish dancing. They are founding members of The Humuhumunukunuku Apua’a and Strathspey Society Band – the world’s finest Hawaiian-themed Scottish and English Country Dance band.
When not dancing David studies pictures of people’s insides, doing research on MRI, specializing in body parts that start with “b”.

Susan Michaels is a teacher and a caller of traditional American dancing, especially contra dancing and square dancing. Susan has called and taught dances for 25 years at local evenings, dance weekends, and week-long adult and family camps throughout the U.S. and Canada. Her “calling” in life, she believes, is to teach people how to hold hands in a circle and have fun!